Oh Astro

This husband and wife duo is sample happy - they're sample crazy. Shit is ridiculous. Oh Astro is husband and wife duo Hank Hofler and Jane Dowe and their latest Champions of Wonder is currently streaming at their promotion teams website here.



These two are like mad scientists - they even look a little kooky - cutting up the best tracks from all over the music landscape and piecing them back to together as the best post-everything groove pop out there.

This is straight from Fanatic Promo's press release - trust me, I ain't hip enough to recognize any of these originals Hofler and Dowe dissect. But just look at some of the works reworked by Oh Astro:

"Snow Queen" - Ratatat "Desert Eagle" and Lily Allen "Everything is Wonderful."

"Hello Fuji Boy" - Hot Chip “Boy From School,” Fujiya & Miyagi “Ankle Injuries,” and Lionel Richie “Hello.”

"Candy Sun Smiles” – Busdriver “Sun Shower,” Gnarls Barkley “Gone Daddy Gone,” and Electronic “Getting Away With It."

CMJ said the debut Oh Astro mini-album, Hello World (Illegal Art) was “funky and pretty...Hello World’s bite-sized samples concoct a weird pop universe." The same could be said of Champions of Wonder. Oh Astro live in a world where the synthesizer has taken over, where humans only speak in sampled cuts of previous conversations, where originality lies in the ability to manipulate previous attempts at originality. The say there's nothing new under the sun so Oh Astro say fuck it - we'll take we what got and rethink that shit.

Can't wait to pick up Champions of Wonder when it hits the street.Oh shit... and the physical release contains surround sound mixes of the first three tracks by Aaron Paolucci (who also mastered the stereo mixes) that can be played on a computer connected to a 5.1 sound system. Fucking nuts. Audiophiles please hide your hard-on.

Here's a link to Oh Astro's label home, Illegal Art, on on Wikipedia. The label is the home of the popular Girl Talk and releases sampled-based music only, challenging copyright law and advocating their artists' right to sample freely.

Visit Oh Astro on Myspace.